The bug reporting tool is available in Control Panel can be used to easily send a bug report to the development team responsible for the software which produced the bug.

To access this tool, go to Control Panel/10.0 → PC-BSD Bug Reporting or type pc-bugreport from the command line. The initial screen for this tool is shown in Figure 8.22a.

Figure 8.22a: PC-BSD® Bug Reporting Utility

Select the software component that most closely matches where the bug occurs. For example, if the bug occurs when using a KDE utility, select "Desktop environment", or if the bug occurs when using an application that was installed using AppCafe®, select "PC-BSD software (pbi)". When in doubt, select "PC-BSD base system".

In the example shown in Figure 8.22b, the user has selected "PC-BSD base system" then "Next".

Regardless of the selection, the resulting screen will be similar to 8.22b. The various screens only differ in which bug tracking system or mailing list is used by the development team for that component. If you select "Desktop environment" you will also be asked to indicate which desktop so that the correct information is displayed for that development team. Similarly, if you select "PBI software" you will be asked to select which PBI produces the error.

If the development team has a bug tracker, its URL will be displayed. If you click the "Launch web browser" button, that website will be opened in the default web browser so that you can search for existing bugs and create a new bug if one does not already exist. Note that you will need to register first if this is your first bug and that you must be logged in in order to create a new bug.

If the development team has a mailing list, its email address will be listed. The URL to the mailing list will also be displayed so that you can search its archives and subscribe to the list. Note that you will need to be subscribed to a mailing list before you can report a bug on that list. To report the bug, click the "Compose email" button to open the default mail application. To subscribe to or read the archives of the list, click the "Launch web browser" button.

Figure 8.20b: Reporting a Bug

The three icons in the "Toolbox" section can be used to gather useful information to include in your bug report. If you click the first icon on the left, a pop-up menu allows you to create any of the following:

Diagnostic report

FreeBSD version (uname -a)

dmesg output

Xorg version

Xorg log

If you click an entry in the menu, the results will be displayed in a window so that you can copy the contents into your bug report.

If you click the second icon, it will generate a PCI devices list. This is useful information if your built-in wireless card is not working.

If you click the third icon, the default snapshot utility for the desktop will open so that you can include a snapshot in your bug report.

Writing Good Bug Reports

While this utility makes it easy to find the correct place to send a bug report, it is still up to you to make sure that your report includes the information that developers need to recreate and eventually fix the bug. The following resources contain useful tips for the various development teams for the bugs you may encounter when using PC-BSD®. Before reporting: